Developers of World of Warcraft have announced a new expansion called Shadowlands. Players will have to travel into the world of the dead to stop Sylvanas from sentencing everyone in Azeroth to eternal death. There will be new features and/or updates coming with it, and some of them will bring major changes to your gameplay. While not everything is set in stone yet, you can get a pretty good idea what will be happening.

1. Level Squish

    Maximum level will be lowered to 60, and it’s not just a number change. Besides fine-tuning stats and damage, your leveling will be separated in three phases: 

• 1-10 in a new starter zone called Exile’s Reach – a new introductory zone for new players; 

• 10-50 you can choose ANY existing expansion as your leveling ground. This means that you’ll be able complete only one expansion and get level 50. How much you will need to grind to hit that mark is unknown yet;

• 50-60 will be set in latest expansion “Shadowlands”;

2. Covenants

    It’s a new kind of Order Hall that you can join to progress a unique story. There are four different covenants, and each of them brings unique rewards, special abilities and new talents for your class. There will a choice of four different abilities that is set on the chosen covenant.

3. Anima

    In Legion and Battle for Azeroth we had Artifacts and would infinitely supply them with power, and the new system will be a replacement for artifacts. In each covenant there will be special NPCs that you can soulbind with a new resource called “Anima”. For binding with them they’ll teach you new abilities and passives. Not a lot of details have been shared, besides Anima not being an infinitely farming resource. It will be very toned down and probably will have something of a weekly or daily cap to make you return to the game every so often.

4. Legendaries return

    Remember legendary items from Legion that just wouldn’t drop to you because you had bad luck with them? They return in Shadowlands, though not through the power of randomness. You will get reagents from different activities such as dungeons, raids, rare quests, etc. When you get enough, you’ll be able to craft a specific legendary of your choice.

5. Tower of Torghast

    There are already similar things in other MMO games, but it finally has come to WoW. Tower will be an infinitely scaling dungeon that you can complete from one to five people. When climbing it will offer new buffs for your party. The higher you climb the better the reward will be.